Saturday, February 11, 2012

How can we be one with Christ if we do not know as He knows, feel as He feels, understand as He understands. We must enter into His suffering even as He enters into ours. This is taking the name of Christ upon us. This is the strait and narrow path that leads to Eternal life.

It is said over and over, if we would be Christ's, we must be one, as He is one with the Father. We must mourn with those who mourn, comfort those who stand in need of comfort, literally. We are commanded to love God, love each other and forgive all people. Not some of them, or just the ones we like, all of them. Every single one, without exception.

"If you do not accuse each other, God will not accuse you. If you have no accuser you will enter heaven. . . . What many people call sin is not sin; I do many things to break down superstition, and I will break it down."

Joseph Smith, History of the Church, 4:445-446

This is the key, right here. Salvation alone is NOT salvation. Our Heavenly Parents' work and glory is to bring to pass the eternal life of Their children, not to pick and choose, or play favorites. Eternal life is life as They live - in perfect unity. If we would be like them, then we must be one. Unity, over and over again is the message.

And we just aren't getting it, like crabs in a bucket, pulling each other down to gain an imaginary advantage.

Oh, for the day when we join together and truly seek Zion - to be of one heart, one mind and to have NO poor among us, whether poor of spirit or poor of possessions.

Monday, February 6, 2012

Jesus had two roles and claimed two titles in mortality - messiah / redeemer and Son of God

Why do we need a redeemer?

The purpose of God is to bring about the immortality and eternal life of man. Why? Man is that he may have joy. Spirits existed and God was the greatest, and He desired that we should be like Him.

How to do this? We needed corporeality (immortality), unity (Eternal life - God's life - my name is Eternal - be one as I and my Father are one - unity) and agency (to act and not be acted upon). Corporeality needs mortality. Thus, after the Creation, the Fall - a descent into mortality, by choice (2 Ne 2 concepts of agency are key - God being God could not force us to be like Him (D&C 121), He could only set up conditions where we could choose to be like Him, for He is an agent, and to be like Him, we must also be agents. 2 Ne 2:26.)

The Fall brings mortality, which is a state in which death occurs, which death is a separation from God and from each other. This is the opposite of God's desire, which is for no death, no separation. We are incapable of resurrecting, incapable of maintaining relationships forever, and are acted upon instead of being actors, and thus we need to be redeemed from the Fall. ("By proving contraries, truth is made manifest." History of the Church, 6:428 - God approached the work from a contrary position, in a way.)

That redemption must then reverse the Fall - avoiding the separation of death by reversing death, restoring to life permanently, and allowing relationships with others and God to be continued and perfected (Atonement), and giving us the chance to be agents, who act and who are not acted upon (immortality and eternal life).

That is what Jesus did for us as a Redeemer. His resurrection nullifies the Fall and makes it possible for the works of God to be accomplished.

How could He do this? As the Son of God (literal or adoptive? KF / SitG indicate that we are eternal, existing with God. Abraham seems to confirm this - spirits, not children. We become children of Israel, and of Christ by adoption, it seems reasonable that we might become children of God by adoption as well.). His Sonship must have been a prerequisite for achieving a redemption. He lived a sinless life (what does that mean exactly if sin = not-love?) and was a full agent, which we are not, capable of taking His life back, despite a descent into mortality, as a result of His pre-mortal divinity.

What a limited understanding I have - I haven't said it exactly right, but I have at least tried to approach it.